CGA to assess Central schemes’ expenses

With over 950 Central schemes running in the country with annual disbursals of Rs 80,000 crore to states, Planning Commission Deputy Chairperson Montek Singh Ahluwalia has okayed a monitoring system for assessing the expenditure on such schemes. The system will be set up by the Controller General of Accounts (CGA). The first part of this monitoring system will be in place within a month and cover 27 flagship projects of the Government such as the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme and the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan.

The expenditure information from the states and the disbursals by the Centre on these schemes will be available at the CGA’s website. Arguing that there was a need to ascertain how states account for the money disbursed to them, Ahluwalia said that Management Information Systems need to be strengthened. The Commission has also asked the CGA to develop an integrated core accounting solution for the Centre and states.